Not All Who Wonder Are Lost
by Blood Dripping Thorns
Summary: An old man meets up with whom he has been searching. The time is still not right to make himself known and his plans apparent. Though he hides his motives well he still brings up susption with squad 7 of the Village Hidden in the Leaves.
1. Chapter 1

Outside of a hidden village stared a dark figure whom kept to the shadows and out of sight. "So this is the Village Hidden in the Leaves. Well, this was easier to find than I thought… so much for being hidden. Hahaha." The dark figure's mock laughter was drowned out by the light rustling of the leaves in the graceful wind. With an impatient sigh the shadowy stranger continued talking into the night's silence. "I've finally found you. You'll pay for what you did, and you better take responsibilities for your past actions." It was a late night and the village full of ninja was quiet, for the most part. The only lively place was the Ramen stand centered near the front of the village. There sat and old dirty looking man dressed in rags from head to toe. He sat there eating his ramen and looking at all the passer-biers with shadow cast eyes with such intensity, it was as if he was looking for someone. _There aren't as many ninja here as I thought there would be, but the ones I did see were easy enough to pick out of the crowd. Hopefully I'll find who I'm looking for soon, the people here are really starting to look at me weird._ _Things were starting to quiet even more as the late-night customers were leaving for home when a group of three young ninjas -no older that fifteen or sixteen- entered the stand. The group consisted of two young men and a young woman with a unusually big forehead. One of the boys (with blond hair) was extremely loud and seemed to know way too much about ramen. He was way more excited than he should have been to be there -it's only ramen-. Both the other boy (with black hair-who let on to be the unofficial leader: calm, cool, and collected), and the girl (who was part of the cause of the commotion that now engulfed the stand do to her yelling at the knuckle-headed yellow haired boy.) looked away from their companion as if no one would know that they were in the same party._ _"Naruto who are you staring at?" inquired the girl with the big forehead. She turned to meet where Naruto was looking. Her long pink hair fell in front of her sea foam green eyes as they fell upon the old ragman._ _"That guy over there looks really weird" answered Naruto with a mouth half full of hot ramen._ _"NARUTO! DON'T STARE AT PEOPLE!" Sakura yelled, "besides, he's not hurting anyone. He's probably here just for the night. You know just passing through." as her temper lessened, she settled down._ _"There's something uneasy about him." The dark haired leader of the gang finally spoke up. His dark eyes staring at the dirty man, seemingly seeing through the people as they walked by disrupting his gaze._ _"Sasuke you too!" Sakura gave out a self-sympathizing sigh._ _Why do they have to be so nois-?_ _Naruto interrupted her thought as he called to someone across the room. "Sensei!"_ _Just then a tall man with gray hair walked over. The old man staring at everyone couldn't get a good look at him from his seat, but he seemed to be a bit uneasy at his arrival. The Sensei's blue headband branded with the mark of the Leave Village was covering his left eye and he wore a black mask that covered half his face, from his nose down._ _"Hello everyone. Now Naruto, what's all the commotion?" The Sensei questioned in a deep stern, yet cheerful voice._ _The yellow haired boy, presumably Naruto raised his hand, pointing with his chopsticks. "That guy over there, we think he's up to something."_ _Their Sensei looked at Naruto with an amused look on his mostly hidden face (the only sign of humor was his one cheerfully closed eye.) "Oh is that so, he looks to me as if he's just passing through. What do you think Sakura?"_ _"Thank you Kakashi Sensei. That's what I said." Sakura chirped in with a know-it-all tone in her voice. Her already big head seemingly growing at the thought that she, once again was right._ _No one saw the strange man flinch as he gasped at the name of the new man, the sensei who just walked in._ _No way! I found him already! Not only him but the boy as well. I have to get out of here before he realizes who I am or could be._ _As if nothing was out of the ordinary the old dirty man laid down his money and generous tip on the table and hurriedly made his was out of the stand._ All the while Kakashi Sensei was watching _Naruto might be right_. Something is up with that man. He had noticed that the man was quite generous with his tip, and by the way he dressed, he should be a bit less careless with his money. Things weren't adding up right with that man.


	2. Chapter 2

_The next morning was a nice one. The sun was shinning brightly, the ground was already warmed up and the people were going through their daily routines. The village center was full of the delicious smells of fresh food that the wind carried all the way to the creek's bridge by the open fields. There is where three young ninja stand loafing around._ _"WHY IS KAKASHI ALWAYS LATE?" complained both Sakura and Naruto in an annoyed, unison voice._ _Sakura continued on while Naruto's attention was averted elsewhere. "We always rush when he sends for us but he's never here to meet us. And it's not like we can take our time because with our luck he'll be waiting for us."_ _"You know he's just making sure we're always on our toes. He's probably hiding in the trees near by waiting until the time is right." Sasuke was so matter-of-factly that Sakura was a bit taken away with him._ _Ohh. Sasuke. He's so intuitive, unlike Naruto! Hmm… where is Naruto anyway? I know he's here somewhere._ _"Hey Naruto," -Hum- "You've been offal quiet, what are you doing?"_ _Not completely paying attention, - his gaze was centered towards the other side of the bridge- he shouted back. "It's that guy from lastnight at the ramen stand. I thought he was weird then, but now he's… He's feeding the birds!"_ _Suddenly in that very instance something clicked. "I can't believe I didn't see it before, and even more surprised Kakashi Sensei didn't see it either…" She blurted out thinking more aloud than to herself._ _Both Sasuke and Naruto were looking at with curiosity in their eyes. And finally Naruto spoke. "See what?"_ _"That's a… a… a WOMAN! It's not a man at all!"_ _"No way!" both Sasuke and Naruto jump up in excitement&. Sasuke stays quiet thinking while Naruto continues on._ _"That's even weirder than I first thought! "_ _What an ugly woman, or is it a pretty man? I'm not sure. Oh well, it's still creepy._ _After standing in deep thought Sasuke came to a puzzling point. "Okay, so what is an old woman doing here dressed in rags and feeding the birds? And more to the point, inside or our village?"_ _"Beats me." Naruto said plainly. "Ooh! Ooh! I know! Maybe she's a spy sent from another village that's out to get us!" In his voice rang a hint of excitement at the thought of a spy._ _"Naruto you're such a fool." Sasuke's response was dry._ _"Humph. Hey Sakura, what do yooou… thiiink…Hey! Sasuke, where did she…? Where did she go?"_ _"Look! She's walking towards the woman!" Sasuke points a finger towards the bench at the other end of the wooden bridge they were standing on where the old woman sat feeding the birds. Both Naruto and he watch as Sakura made her way to the rag lady._ _I'll get to the bottom of this. Those two have to be so nosey, well fine! But they could at least get their facts straight._ _As she approached, she could hear the faint sound of singing. It sounded of a sad song, but the words were of a loving joy._ _"Ooooh, you knoooow_ _You knooow what to saaay_ _Saaaay "I looove yooou"_ _Ooooh, I think you've got to know right awaaay_ _"Maaayebe meeee toooo"_ _Yooou_ _You are a niiice cooool breeeeze in meee_ _I feeeel yooou…"_ _The old woman took in a deep breath to continue her sad love song when someone cut her of._ _"Excuse me? Ma'am&?…"_ _The Old woman looked up at the darling whom had interrupted her meditation', to find a young girl looking back at her with a cheerful smile and curious eye. She gave her a some-what startled, yet polite greeting. "Hmm? Oh hello there young miss."_ _"I'm sorry to bother you. May I sit down?" The girl's voice was sweet, emphasizing her youth._ _"Oh, of course you can." Replied the old woman happily at the thought or having some company. " Here. Have some breadcrumbs. We can talk and feed the birds."_ _Great. I don't thing this is going to be easy. I feel so stupid. "Let's feed the birds."She gave a small sigh of impatience._ _Well, time to start talking'. I just hope I can hold out long enough, I'm starved._ _"Thank you." The young girl graciously takes her seat along with the feed._ _Oh she's nothing more than a normal old lady. Well, aside from her clothes._ _"By the way my name is Sakura." As she introduces herself the hungry birds begin to gather around her feet where she just threw some breadcrumbs._ _"That's a beautiful name."_ _Sakura's face starts to turn cherry red. "Oh thank you uh…?"_ _"Oh you can just call me Granny Kay."_ _"Oh, Granny Kay. Thank you."_ _"Not a problem. So what does a nice girl like you want to know?"_ _Sakura shot a look of confusion towards Granny Kay._ _How did she know I wanted to ask her something?_ _"I can tell there's something on your mind," Once again the girls face started to turn red. "Not many young people like you would come to feed the birds with an old has been such as myself."._ _Still working on the rest of my chapter… if I get some_ **_nice_** _reviews I'll get the rest up quicker… So I hope you've enjoyed my brainchild of a FanFic XD_ & _I'm trembling… with excitement… lol Sam teehee :P _& _How do you spell ma'am Sam? "mama!" and I thought I was bad at spelling XP _


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